


Death Is Another Form Of Divorce

by fadeverb



Series: Mortal Lives [2]
Category: In Nomine
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-17
Updated: 2013-08-17
Packaged: 2017-12-23 20:17:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/930687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fadeverb/pseuds/fadeverb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Irina married a demon. She doesn't know yet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death Is Another Form Of Divorce

He'd taken the boys to the estate, and once more she was alone in the city, with quiet servants and a house that might as well be empty. Irina sat in the bedroom, feet tucked up underneath her, and stared at herself in the mirror. Never pretty. She was never pretty, never had been pretty, never would be pretty, and age would do nothing to soften her face, give her not even the arch elegance her mother had acquired in old age. He'd shown little interest in her since the marriage. Blink and five years are gone by, the boys old enough to spend their days out alone without a governess, with an awkward step-mother who never knew what to say to make them understand. If she blinked again there'd be another five years gone, and soon she'd be too old for children. No baby to draw a connection between them, only the long silences. She used to love to hear him speak.

After a time she stood up and drew the curtain over the mirror. Put slippers on her feet, the blue beaded ones, as if it mattered. As if anyone would notice. He never had time for her, always arguing with his brother over this or that, politics and work and concepts she couldn't understand. She could have spoken about politics, about the restless men who spoke in the streets, the way they looked at her when she passed, but men never listened when women spoke.

In the empty drawing room, too elegant for her tastes, she wondered when she'd stopped loving her husband.

The library held some comfort. Some days the boys would listen to her there, sharp eyes a little too old for their faces, as she directed them to the books that spoke of fine scientific theories. It wasn't right for boys to grow up without a mother, but she'd come too late to their lives, never fully accepted. Their father barely spoke to them, and their uncle... She shivered, and drew her shawl closer. Some nights she dreamed that he'd died, and woke happy. It was impious of her to think this way, to wish ill on a fellow Christian, but her husband's brother was no good man. She hated having him in the house. He took too firm a hand with the boys when her husband did too little, and pushed them closer to sin.

("I spoke with Maria," she'd told her husband. "Anton was--he was acting very improperly towards her." What boy could be so cruel, at only fourteen? And his little brother always a few steps behind, ready to follow that example. "Your brother found them, but he only laughed." And her husband, he'd spoken to the boys, sharp words that made them cower, but she saw their uncle smile when he believed none saw.)

She spread a book across her lap, let her mind sink into translation. It was childish of her to hold coldness against her husband. He was good man, if not a warm one. He never raised his hand against her in anger, showed no irritation at her propensity towards reading scientific texts, let her manage the household as she liked. Irina sank into the Latin of the book, trying to quiet her mind. Though his brother lived there with them, her husband had stepped in at the first...small impropriety...and the incident had not been repeated.

("Irinushka," he had said, always so serious, "I mean to ask your father for your hand in marriage. Will you object?" She smiled at him, and said, "When we're married, you'll have to let me read your notes." But he'd never let her look at them, and when she dared to seek them out in secret, she found them written in a code she couldn't translate, no matter how often she tried.)

Sound rattled past her, so loud it should have broken the glass, and Irina dropped her book. A maid rushed into the room. "Mistress? Is something the matter?"

"Did you hear that?" Irina asked. The noise was still there, a long roar, as if every train in a thousand miles were rushing by at once.

The maid nodded hesitantly. "Yes, the book falling. Are you well?"

Irina took a slow breath. Retrieved the book from the floor. "I must have fallen asleep, and been dreaming," she said. "It was only a dream. No matter." She smiled until the maid left, hid a trembling hand beneath her robe.

(Her mother had told her never to speak of the strange things she'd heard. "Pay no attention, my Irinushka. Pretend you don't hear them. It's only evil spirits, trying to distract you, to draw you into their ways." She'd grown accustomed to pretending not to hear strange sounds that rattled through her bones.)

After a time, the noise went away.

Irina set aside the book, and went to her study. She chose a fine pen and a sheet of paper, and began to write out words she would never deliver. The drawers were full of them, all the sentences respectable wives wouldn't say. The night before the wedding, she'd taken the box of papers covered in the sentences proper young women wouldn't say, and lit it on fire, out by the pond in the garden. Now she had that much paper again and twice as much beside.

After she'd finished with those words, she took out new paper, and wrote a letter.

_My dear Anton, I hope you are well. Remember to wear your coat and scarf when riding, as the spring is not always so warm as it seems, and I would not wish for you to catch a chill. Give my warmest regards to your father, and listen to what he says. He's a wise man, who you would do well to listen to. Recall that your little brother looks to you in all things. If you set him an example of virtue, he will follow it. Some day both of you will be great and clever men like your father, if you mark that example already laid before you. I put my fondest trust in you, that you might do honor to the name of your family in all your deeds._

When she'd finished with a letter to each of her step-sons, Irina took out another paper, for a letter to her husband. But words wouldn't come, no words that she could put down for him to see. She took out one of the papers from her drawer, and wrote there.

_My dear husband, you loved me once, I know. You called me a clever girl. When Father spoke with you in his study, you never sent me away, and I know you saw how I listened to all your words. I listened to you then. Why won't you listen to me?_

"Ah," Irina said to herself, very quietly. "It is because I don't speak these things. You can't hear what I will not say to you." She put the paper aside, and went back to the library.

She ate dinner alone, the book laid beside her at the table. It wasn't proper, but there was no one there but the servants to see, and she'd long since stopped caring what tales they might carry. No one had any interest in gossip about the ugly wife of a man who had little use for society. If her husband's brother were married, they'd speak of her, but instead she caught whispers of who that man had been seen with at the last party.

(A cousin, pretty and perfect, had asked Irina if she thought him a husband to seek out. It was a black mark on her soul that she'd come so near to telling the silly girl yes, only so that he might be married and out of her house. Her virtue lay in how she'd taken the young woman aside and told her to stay well away from that man. A very small mark of honor, that.)

The maid hurried in, with a tray and two cards. "Visitors," she said. "Two men, one an officer of the military."

"At this time of night?" Irina pushed away her plate. "Tell them my husband is away at his country estate, and his brother with him. If the matter is so urgent, they'll want to leave promptly."

A moment later, the maid was back. "They say they wish to speak to you, mistress. Not to your husband or his brother. And that the matter is urgent." Her voice hinted at the scandal of entertaining strange men so late at night.

"Show them to the drawing room, and fetch me my cloak," Irina said.

She paused in the hallway by the mirror to adjust her cloak, to touch her hair. Little adjustments that would make no difference, but helped her feel prepared. The book under her arm helped more, though she couldn't have said why.

Irina stepped into the drawing room, and tried not to think of politics, of whispers in the street, of what was said by angry young men.

One man stood up as she entered, bowed lightly as proper. He was the officer the maid had spoken of, neatly dressed with a sword at his side and well-polished boots. At the collar of his jacket she could make out a thin line of the shirt beneath, and a little charred hole there, as if he'd been sitting too near a fireplace. It seemed out of place on someone who'd taken such care of his uniform. The other man was tall and slender, with a sharp face and long fingers. Too much like her husband for her to look at him without feeling a pang in her chest. The second man did not stand, only watched her with light blue eyes that promised something she couldn't read.

"Madame," said the officer, as he rose from the bow. "I apologize for the late hour." His voice held no trace of apology. "May we have a few moments to speak with you?"

"Certainly," she said, and sank into a chair across from them. She set the book she carried on the end table beside her. "What business brings you here so urgently tonight?"

"A matter dealing with your husband." The officer sat down, as straight-backed as when he'd been standing. "Aristarkh--"

"Is not my husband," Irina said, more sharply than she'd intended. It wasn't proper to interrupt a man while he spoke. She composed herself, uncomfortable under the sudden intensity of his gaze. "You speak of my brother-in-law. I am the wife of that man's brother, Makariy."

The officer turned slightly, and Irina caught the brief nod from the other man, as if in confirmation of what she'd said. "My apologies again," said the officer, as smoothly and insincerely as before. "There was a small...error...in the information we were given."

She considered that error none too small, but this was no moment to express her views on that man. "All is forgiven," she said, in the sweet voice her prettier cousins could use better. "But if you wish to speak of Aristarkh, there's little I'll be able to help you with. He lives here, true, but spends much of his time elsewhere."

"You are aware, madam, that your husband and his brother have been doing work commissioned by the Tsar himself?"

Irina thought of politics, and tucked one hand inside her cloak where it could tremble freely. "He's spoken of this to me," she said. "Though I know little about the specifics of his work."

"A matter of some urgency has arisen," said the officer, "and we need access to some of his notes. I believe he keeps them here."

Irina put on an arch look. "You would ask me to search through my husband's belongings to pass them on to strangers?"

"It's a matter of great importance to the Tsar," said the officer, leaning forward. "We come here at his command to acquire these. I assure you, your husband will be able to confirm this for you when he returns. For now, if you could show us to his study, we'd be able to find the necessary papers ourselves."

The thin man shifted in his seat, eyes blinking, and Irina thought to herself, _He's lying, and the other man knows it._ She smiled, and said, "Any man might come across an officer's uniform, by one means or another, and claim to be on a mission from the Tsar. Have you any proof?"

"We hadn't the time to acquire a signed warrant," said the officer. "I can send for another officer to come and vouch for me, if you're concerned about the security of your husband's research."

Irina smiled at them, and thought, _Two uniforms may be acquired as easily as one, but you are too determined to let me speak around this. _"That won't be necessary," she said. "But I won't have strangers looking through my husband's personal correspondence. If you will pardon me for a few minutes, I'll fetch what of his notes I can find in the study."__

__She stepped out of the room in the middle of the thanks she received, as insincere as any apologies, and strode off to her husband's study. The notes he considered important, the ones in the code, were in the second drawer on the left of his desk. She took these out, and walked briskly to her bedroom. There, she buried them at the bottom of her chest of summer linens._ _

__There was a small closet, used mostly by the maids for storing brooms and mops, directly adjacent to the drawing room. Irina had caught the younger boy there once, carving a hole where it would hide behind a small table, so that he could listen in on conversations held in the drawing room. She entered the closet, and crouched down, no matter that her cloak swept across the floor, to lean her ear against that hole._ _

__"I don't think she knows anything," said the officer, in a brisker tone than he'd used in her presence. "But she suspects _us_ of something, and that's no good. We may need to take an indirect route. How badly do you need those notes?"_ _

__"Do you want to find out four months from now that they had a whole list of side projects they never wrote about at the lab?" That must have been the thin man's voice, though he'd never spoken when she was in the room. A little high, annoyed, like a man pestered all day by tiny irritations. "Nor do I trust your assessment. You may be healed now, but you lost two forces in that fight. Your judgment is not unimpaired." The words didn't make sense, drawing from a context she didn't have. Irina frowned, and waited for some clue to give them meaning._ _

__"That bastard hit harder than I thought he could. Serves me right for assuming unarmed meant harmless. Or that scientist meant harmless, for that matter."_ _

__"There are Malakim who serve the same I do, who'd object if you made that assumption," said the thin man, but Irina could barely hear him, no matter that he made less sense than before. What had that fine young officer in his neat uniform been doing before he came here? Those sounds she wasn't supposed to notice, they came so often with bad news, from the day her mother died to the time one of the boys broke her mirror. And the noise had been so loud, so very loud..._ _

__"No matter," said the officer. "Either she's a fool he never told about the truth of his work, or she was in on it. If she's stupid, we can work around her. And if she's not..."_ _

__There was no conclusion to that sentence. Irina stood up, stepped out of the closet, and dusted herself off on the way back to the drawing room. She said under her breath, over and over, "I'm sorry, but I was unable to find anything useful. Would you like to take a look?"_ _

__When she walked into the room, the officer stood up, bowed again. Saw that she carried nothing in her hands, and his face fell, a mask of disappointment that she could see through now. "I'm very sorry," she said, "but I was unable to find any useful papers there. Would you like to take a look yourselves?"_ _

__Another look between the thin man and the officer. She'd never been well practiced at lying. "Thank you," said the officer. "We'll go take a look." He waited for his companion to stand and join him. As they walked towards the hallway, the officer touched the book laid on the table. "Newton's _Principia_. Are you a scientist too?" With a gentle smile for women who consider themselves learned._ _

__Irina laughed lightly. "Oh, no," she said. "It's only one of my husband's books that I meant to put back on the shelf, as he left it out when he went to the country." She led them up the stairs to her husband's study, hands tucked inside her cloak._ _

__The officer had an apologetic smile for her as he searched the desk, leafing briskly through the letters and accounts stored there. She stood to the side with a smile as polite and vacant as she could make it, not saying, _You bastard, what have you done to my husband? What's happened to the man I once loved? _____

____("I've spoken with my brother," he'd said, so blank-faced she knew he was very angry. He was cold, but he wasn't angry at _her_. She'd heard the words from two rooms away, even as she'd sent the boys out to the garden to play, away from the wrath of their father. "It won't happen again. He knows better than that." His kiss was only a brush of lips across her forehead, but she took it for the love he meant. Her mother had explained how men showed what they couldn't bring themselves to say, in every deed.)_ _ _ _

____A fierce thrill ran through her when the officer stood up, looked to the thin man, said, "I don't see anything here. Maybe he took his notes with him."_ _ _ _

____The thin man shrugged eloquently. He turned to her, and said, "Do you know of any other places he might have kept his research notes, in this house?"_ _ _ _

____"No," Irina said. "He sometimes worked on them in the library, but he only kept them here."_ _ _ _

____"I'm sorry to have bothered you for so long," said the officer, and bowed to her once more. "My apologies for disrupting your evening." He gave her a long, searching look. "If you should come across any of his notes..."_ _ _ _

____"I'll be sure to send you word," Irina said. "I have your card. When my husband returns home, he'll know where he's put them. I meant to send him a letter today, and I can ask him. Perhaps he'll write before he's back, he _does_ spend many spring days off in the country with the boys." _My God, what have you done to my sons?__ _ _ _

____(She found the younger boy crying after the older had hit him again, and gathered her stepson up on her lap. "Hush," she said, holding him close, being for that one moment a real mother in place of the one long dead. "It'll heal soon, and you'll feel better. I'm here." For a few minutes he'd rested there, the dangerous glint in his eyes gone, and she'd felt...right. Useful. "Don't worry," she said. "I'll speak to your father about it. I won't let anyone hurt you.")_ _ _ _

____In her room, she took off the cloak, the robe, stood in front of the mirror and saw herself once more. Never pretty, seldom loved, but she was strong. "All the saints and angels," she whispered, "keep him safe. Ask what you will of me, but keep him safe."_ _ _ _

____She went to bed, and dreamed of politics._ _ _ _

____Irina woke up to a sound she wasn't supposed to hear. Like one violinist hitting the wrong note in the middle of a song. She got out of bed, and put on a robe. Left her feet bare. The sound came from down the hall, where her husband's study waited._ _ _ _

____She stopped first at the room belonging to her brother-in-law, and searched inside the cabinet drawers there until she found the hidden pistol. She'd wondered at it, the first time she came across such a thing in a secret place, but how does one admit to searching a man's rooms when he's out? Her feet made no noise she could hear as she walked down the hallway to her husband's study._ _ _ _

____The door was closed, but not latched. She raised the gun with one hand, and pushed the door open with the other. Her husband was so irritable at unexpected noise; she made sure the servants kept every door well-oiled. A silent swing open, and there she stood with her pistol ready, while the fine young officer, now dressed in dark clothing, crouched under the desk poking at the bottom of drawers._ _ _ _

____"What have you done with my husband?" she asked._ _ _ _

____He spun around quickly. Froze when he saw the gun, and then stood up slowly, his hands in plain sight. "I didn't hear you come in," he said, perfectly calm._ _ _ _

____"That was my intention, yes." She didn't let her hands shake. "What have you done with my husband?"_ _ _ _

____"No more than he deserved," said the man. "Less, I think." He studied her silently for a moment, as if considering and discarding means of convincing her to put away the gun. "He was a traitor to this country."_ _ _ _

____"These are days when men call each other traitors for disagreeing over how one should interpret an author's works, or for saying it's a fine day out when another doesn't like the weather. I'd be better convinced if you tried to tell me some faction wished him dead, for serving the Tsar." Strange, how calm her own voice lay on her lips, coming out of her mouth with all the sentences proper wives never said._ _ _ _

____"Why do you believe we killed him?" She'd never seen a man stand so still before, barely breathing as he waited before her._ _ _ _

____"Why should I tell you this?"_ _ _ _

____The man sighed, a small, weary sound. "It would have been much easier if you were stupid," he said._ _ _ _

____Irina laughed. It felt ugly in her mouth. "My life would have been much easier if I had been pretty and stupid rather than clever and ugly, but God doesn't grant us these choices. We do the best we can with what he's given us. Now tell me, what have you done with my husband? What have you done with our _sons_?"_ _ _ _

____The man spread his empty hands. "I have no pretty stories for you, madam. If you wish to shoot me, you might as well. You'd like nothing I have to say." Another weary sigh. "And tonight, I am in no condition to puzzle out how to deal with you better than this."_ _ _ _

____"Lost two forces. What kind of forces? You're still connected to the ground, so it can't be gravity." Her hands shook, pistol jerking in front of her. "I require no pretty stories. Tell me the truth. I would rather know the ugly reality than think up my own lies."_ _ _ _

____"You heard me." The man tilted his head to one side, as if she could be better studied from another angle. "I was quiet, but you...heard the disturbance. Yet I don't think you're Hellsworn."_ _ _ _

____"The evil spirits make the noises," Irina said, before she'd realized she was speaking out loud. She pressed her lips firmly together. _Never speak of what you hear, Irinushka.__ _ _ _

____"Sometimes," said the man. "Or sometimes the creatures of Heaven." He dropped down to one knee in front of her. "Madam, you have been wronged. You've given your love to creatures of the devil, believing them to be good, and so been shut away from the true good in this world. You are destined for more than they ever offered you."_ _ _ _

____He sang, and light shone around him, bright as day._ _ _ _

____Irina sat down. Her legs wouldn't hold her any longer, and all that noise came from the bright creature before her. "He was a good man," she whispered. "He loved me. You killed him."_ _ _ _

____The bright creature, angel of God, took her hand. It felt like an ordinary human hand, warm against hers. "No, madam," he said. "He was no good man, and he...he may have been kind to you, but he was no good man. Your children were never true children, only devils playing at childhood."_ _ _ _

____"I loved them," Irina said. "Now they're dead, all of them."_ _ _ _

____"Not dead," said the angel. "Fled back to Hell, though it would be better for you if we had killed them. Now that you've spoken with us, you may be in danger." He stood up, drew her up with him, and the light shone around both of them. "If you pledge to serve Heaven, then I may yet be able to save you."_ _ _ _

____"I've always served God, to the best of my abilities," Irina said. "But oh, what does it matter? My husband and my sons are fiends of hell, and all my efforts to teach them honor and godliness..."_ _ _ _

____"My lady," said the angel, "there is always hope. But you must come with me now." He smiled at her sadly. "Angels and demons alike hear the sounds you've heard, and they're active in this city tonight. If you will trust me, and follow me, I'll take you some place safe. My Archangel Laurence willing, we will find a way for you to serve Heaven to the true limits of your abilities."_ _ _ _

____He held her hand while she found shoes, a robe, a cloak, and eventually the light dimmed, but he was still an angel, no matter that he looked to be a man. She took the notes from the chest, pressed them to him. "One more thing," she said, as he drew her towards the door._ _ _ _

____"If you must," he said. "But quickly."_ _ _ _

____She found the book she'd left in the drawing room._ _ _ _

____(He gave it to her on their wedding day, late at night when all the festivities were done and it was only the two of them together. "You may find it edifying," he said. She smiled at him, and said, "If you keep giving me books, soon I'll know as much as you do. And then what will you do?" He answered her with a kiss, and the book was forgotten for the night.)_ _ _ _

____"I'm ready," she said, holding the book tightly to her chest. "Bright angel, lead me to where God would have me go."_ _ _ _

____The angel took her by the hand. She left the house, and closed the door behind her._ _ _ _


End file.
